Customer Reviews

Sea of Grass [VHS]

5 star:		(4)
4 star:		(5)
3 star:		(1)
2 star:		(2)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

The fourth pairing of Katharine Hepburn and Spencer Tracy is pure magic. Kate is perfect as the southern belle who goes out west to marry a cattleman. Spencer Tracy is the cattleman whom Kate marries. From the start, Kate and Spencer don't see eye to eye on different issues, and an affair between Kate and Melvyn Douglas doesn't help the marriage. The cast is superb, even if parts of the movie seem to drag. Great ROMANTIC WESTERN/DRAMA!

This is the saddest Spencer Tracy movie I've seen. Tracy plays a prosperous cattle baron, who, although he rules his range with an iron hand, can't rule his marriage or his family, and everything else goes sour for him, too. His high-society wife from St. Louis (played by Hepburn) doesn't see eye-to-eye with him on the question of the open range, she cuckolds him by having an affair with Melvyn Douglas and having a son by him (which both Tracy and the son eventually figure out), the land endures years of droughts, squatters move in on him despite his best efforts to keep them away, with even the U.S. Calvalry even coming down on him, and his devil-may-care son is eventually killed by a posse after he kills a gambler who was insulting Tracy's honor, and worst of all, he and his wife split up for almost 20 years after just a couple of years of marriage.

The story has a happy ending, though, after Tracy and Hepburn finally get together at the very end of the movie. Both are outstanding in their roles, and the movie is worth seeing despite the overall downer of a plot.

I saw this movie for the first time over the weekend. I enjoyed the movie which is a sort of Western soap opera. What I found most impressive was the relationship between the two stars of the movie. Both characters came across as quite reserved which is unusual given their other performances together.

I called the movie a Western soap opera and I do so because this one will bring a few tears to more than one set of eyes. Yet it starts out with the boldness of the tale of a cattle baron. The relationship between Tracy and Hepburn reaches a crisis and its' resolution changes the direction of the movie. There is a scandal that almost slips our attention after what we're used to seeing in modern movies. In fact, it wasn't until later that I figured out the impact of some of the previous dialogue. The ending is worth hanging around for.

This movie was well-made with good direction ad decent acting. I'm not trying to put down those higher up on the bill but I thought the best acting was done by Edgar Buchanan. I was doing some math in my head; the movie begins on the Great Plains in 1880. It culminates roughly 20-25 years later bringing it into the 20th Century. However, the clothes, backdrop, transportaion modes, and technology never left 1880. If that's my biggest quibble, it can't have been too bad. This was a movie that turned out to be better than I had expected.

"The Sea of Grass" is the fourth of the nine films that Spencer Tracy and Katharine Hepburn made together, and for me it is the least appealing one of the lot. The 1947 MGM film was directed by Elia Kazan from Conrad Richter's novel, "The Sea of Grass" about the fierce struggle between the open-range cattlemen and the farmers who are civilizing the Old West. Two years earlier Tracy and Hepburn had made "Without Love," and in the interim period Tracy had starred on Broadway in Robert E. Sherwood's "The Rugged Path." By the time Tracy returned to Hollywood his hair had turned gray, which made him look much older than Hepburn. Fortunately this worked for the film in terms of being another dimension of the gulf between the husband and wife they played in the film.

Lutie Cameron (Hepburn) is a St. Louis belle who comes to New Mexico to wed cattle baron Colonel James B. Brewton (Tracy). The problem, of course, is that the Colonel loves the endless "sea of grass" of his domain that his cattle roam much more than he loves his wife. Lutie is also horrified by the way the cattlemen treat the farmers, which costs her the only female friend she has, Selina Hall (Ruth Nelson). To get back at her husband, Lutie has has an affair with Brice Chamberlain (Melvyn Douglas), the lawyer who is the Colonel's mortal enemy. The scandal tears the Brewton marriage apart and Lutie leaves, although her illegitimate son, Brock (Robert Walker, who would go from playing Hepburn's son to being her lover in their next film together, "Song of Love") and her daughter Sara Beth (Phyllis Thaxter) stay behind on the ranch. In the end, personal tragedy forces Lutie and the Colonel to reconcile and this 2-hour-plus movie is finally over.

Despite having two of the most respected actors of all time in the leading roles "The Sea of Grass" was probably doomed as soon as Kazan was hired to direct. Kazan's introspective, psychological, Actor's Studio approach to acting is personified in cinematic history by Marlon Brando, whose performance in "A Streetcar Named Desire" is arguably the greatest acting job ever. But while Brando represents one great acting tradition of the 20th century, but so does Laurence Olivier's classical tradition and the naturalistic, instinctive style epitomized by Spencer Tracy. Given their diametrically opposed approaches, the director and his star might as well have been speaking different languages. The result, is that Tracy, one of the greatest actors every, pretty much sleepwalks through this entire movie.

Add to this the fact that Tracy's character is rather unsympathetic from start to finish. He gives orders without explanation, expecting obedience whether any one agrees with him or not, a philosophy that applies to his family and hired hands alike Richter's novel could fill in the gaps as to what Brewton is really thinking, but there is nothing comparable in the script by Marguerite Roberts and Vincent Lawrence. Chamberlain is hardly a better alternative for Lutie, whose adultery might be understandably but is hardly commendable, especially by the standards of post-War America. It is rather surprising that Lutie, only a step above being a mail-order bride, has the gumption to stand up to her husband, even if it means going behind his back. There was more chemistry between Tracy and Hepburn in "Keeper of the Flame" when her character was in mourning for her dead husband. No wonder Edgar Buchanan, who plays Jeff, the cook on the Brewton ranch, keeps stealing scenes from the two stars.

"The Seas of Grass" comes down to how big of a train wreck there will be at the end of the film as the head strong Brock Brewton takes the worst traits of the man he thinks is his father and adds them to pretty cruel mean streak. There is a potential Greek tragedy buried here, but once Lutie leaves the ranch there is no sympathetic figure remaining to cause us to care. Adding insult to injury, the sea of grass of the title exists entirely in terms of rear screen projections behind the cast. No wonder there seems to be something inherently false about the story and the performances. Still worth watching because Tracy and Hepburn are in it, but his rather empty performance is quite disconcerting. The dynamic of most Tracy & Hepburn films is the battle of the sexes. Usually one of them wins, but this time the verdict has to be that he loses.

For all those Hepburn & Tracy fans this movie is a must see. I don't recall seeing it before, and I was completely enthralled by it. Set in the west divided by ranchers and homesteaders,the Brewtons marriage is soon strained when Lutie (Hepburn) sides with the plight of the farmers. They have a daughter and then Lutie has an affair which produces a son, and after a few years when the marriage is even more strained,returns to St.Louis without her children. The Brewton's are not reunited until near the end of the film after their son is killed. Thank you Amazon for releasing this film.

I remember seeing this movie about 25 years ago with a girlfriend and never forgot it. I recently ordered it to share with my newest movie watching friend and she liked the movie as well. It has a very believeable plot showing how unsuitable some areas are for farming and what happens when the future isn't planned for.

..Tracy's alcholism was a major problem on the set..He did'nt want to do the film but Hepburn (who carries the film, to no avail) cajoled him into making it.Kazan told everyone he knew to avoid seeing this disaster..Kazan got his wish.!..By the way this movies original running time according to Maltins movie guide is 131 minutes..Warner Bros..where's the missing 8..Hello..?..And how many times are they going to use Tom & Jerrys "Cat Concerto" (4-26-47) as a filler.?.A.Award or not it's a bore now.!

Sea Of Grass found Spencer Tracy is very poor health due to alcoholism, and he had to be cued and pushed and cajoled into making the film by Katharine Hepburn. The sententiousness that could often marr his performances is here in every suit in the deck, and it's his cover in a masque of propreity that takes away from many serious films he did act without Hepburn and with her. It's so noticable here, as in The Mountain, Old Man and The Sea, Devil at 4r o'clock, and then with Stanley Kramer, he blew everyone away. But Hepburn always kept him up and on his feet and filming, especially here.

Katharine Hepburn and Melvyn Douglas are the film, and the rational scenario is for them to marry and leave Spencer Tracy to his grass.

Hepburn is fabulous; her gestures alone suffice, and then her scenes with Tarcy where he is not on track, are great because she pulls Tracy up and then takes over, almost acting for them both, which often happened in their dframatic films together.

Kazan went on to other things, better things: The great Marlon Brando films and the Tennessee Williams film with Brando in Streetcar, and the daring, condemned by the Roman Catholic Church Baby Doll show how far he and especially Brando took him. Also, there is 1960s' Wild River, a bit of Sea of Grass here, but a better film, with Montgomery Clift and Lee Remick.

But in Sea Of Grass, lookk to Katharine Hepburn for high end acting,and this I think is true of her even in the comedy hits with Tracy.Cary Grant is every bit as good as Tracy, and then some, and then there is James Stewart in the Philadelphia Story. Tracy is best later on in great films like Inherit The Wind, Judgement at Nuremberhg, but definatley very funny in and out of Hepburn films.. an out treasure would be Father of the Bride.

Tracy and Hepburn in dramatic films..not a good combination and they wisely stayed away from them for the most part. But Katharine Hepbnurn..she is the star.

Brava Katharine, and so, see Sea of Grass.

The article was recieved ahead of time. It was new as stated and it plays very well. Would reccomend anyone to the Amazon site.

The Sea Of Grass has a great cast headed by Tracy & Hepburn in their only western together. Unfortunately it's more of a drama than a western and may seem a bit slow to western fans. Also their romance is strained throughout which may seem odd to Tracy/Hepburn fans, but won't disappoint in the long-run. The plot chiefly concerns how her one-time indiscretion strains the marriage and disrupts the family, particularly the effects on their son, fathered outside the marriage by Melvyn Douglas. The best thing about the film is the terrific supporting cast, which includes Edgar Buchanan (Uncle Joe on Petticoat Junction), Phyllis Thaxter (Lois Lane on Superman), Robert Armstrong (King Kong), and a host of b-movie favorites: Charles Trowbridge, Morris Ankrum, Douglas Fowley, Whit Bissell, Charles Middleton (Ming the Merciless in Flash Gordon serials), and several others. But particularly outstanding are Harry Carey (So Dear To My Heart) as the doctor and Robert Walker as the bastard son, both giving their best performances I've seen.